Master Joaquín Banegas has just passed away, a historic and essential figure of the Cuban school of ballet

June 21, 2023

Sad news full of sorrow has filled all lovers and servants of Cuban ballet, master Joaquín Banegas has just passed away, one of the historic and essential figures of the Cuban school of ballet.

Born on August 16, 1935 in the small town of San Benito, municipality of Alto Songo, in the Santiago de Cuba region, in the bosom of a humble peasant family, from a very young age he gave outlet and direction to his emotions through the movements of his body, creating forms, steps and poses that he did not know about, but which were nothing other than dance itself, but in a spontaneous and intuitive form.

This vocation grew in him in a constant manner, and it was for this reason that in 1951, eager to find the chosen path, he traveled to La Habana, where he combined the search for subsistence through various jobs with his first ballet classes at the Municipal Conservatory, under the guidance of Alberto Alonso. The following year, he did not cease in his effort and continued alternating jobs of different kinds with the classes he taught at the Pro Arte-Musical Society of Oriente with Bulgarian professor Georges Milenoff.

In 1953, by virtue of a scholarship granted to young people with talent but limited economic resources, Joaquín entered the Alicia Alonso Ballet Academy, an institution designed to form the first generation of professional Cuban dancers and lay the foundations of the Cuban school of ballet, today recognized worldwide.

There, under the guidance of Alicia and Fernando Alonso, José Parés, Cuca Martínez and other foreign pedagogues, such as the Russians Alexandra Fedorova, León Fokine and Ana Ivanova; and the English Mary Skeaping and Phyllis Bedells, he firmly cemented his unwavering vocation. In 1954, with the Ballet de Cuba he performed in Argentina, Chile and Uruguay.

In 1956 he participated in the National Tour of Protest against the aggression of the Batista tyranny against Alicia and the Ballet de Cuba and the following year he joined the Experimental Dance Workshop, which in close collaboration with the Alicia Alonso Ballet Academy, kept the flame of ballet alive in Cuba. That same year he traveled to Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, where in his capacity as lead dancer, he organized numerous performances in theaters and nightclubs in those countries.

In 1959 he returned to Cuba, and in the Opposition Competition held that year to reorganize the battered Company, he obtained the rank of soloist and with it continued a successful artistic career, which defined him as one of the first male figures of Cuban ballet in that period.

From 1961 onwards Joaquín made the decision to abandon the stage and dedicate himself to teaching. His recognized virtues, those of rigor and greater demands, he brought to his later work as a pedagogue, with the same dedication that characterized him in each of his performances as an interpreter.

When the Provincial and National Schools of Ballet were created in 1961-1962, he was among the select group to which Fernando and Alicia gave the task of forming the new generation of Cuban dancers within the technical, ethical and aesthetic principles of the Cuban school of ballet.

In Joaquín's pedagogical work, a prominent place is occupied by his tenure as Director of the Ballet de Camagüey, during the period from 1969 to 1973, in which he had the valuable collaboration of his wife, Puerto Rican dancer Silvia Marichal.

To this Company, the second of its kind in the country, founded on December first, 1967, through the efforts of Alicia and Fernando and the unforgettable Vicentina de la Torre, he contributed his valuable knowledge. During this period the Ensemble defined its professional stature, enriched the training of its novice members and developed an interesting choreographic repertoire, especially that which emerged from the talent of young creators such as Gustavo Herrera and Iván Tenorio, whom he encouraged and gave full support.

Upon his return to his Alma Mater, the National Ballet of Cuba, he assumed multiple tasks as advisor, maître and organizer. To him are closely linked the resounding triumphs of our dancers in competitive international competitions, such as the Varna, Japan and Peru Competitions, and in the various tours through countries of Europe, Asia and America.

The name Joaquín Banegas is inseparably linked to numerous endeavors in the national dance field, among them the National Commission for the Evaluation of Cuban Dance Movement; Director and professor of the Ballet of the Cuban Institute of Radio and Television, advisor on methodology in the National Directorate of Artistic Teaching; the Faculty of Dance Art of the Higher Institute of Art (ISA), the Dance Chair and the Summer Courses of the Complutense University of Madrid, which bore the name of Alicia Alonso.

As an eminent representative of the Cuban school of ballet, he has extended his wisdom to dance entities in Mexico, Puerto Rico, Colombia, Czechoslovakia, Japan, the United States and the Dominican Republic. Several Latin American countries have conferred important distinctions upon him in recognition of his many merits.

In 1975 in his Central Report to the 1st Congress of the Communist Party of Cuba, Fidel defined the Cuban school of ballet as one of the greatest cultural achievements of the Revolution. To this achievement, Master Banegas is insolubly linked.

On October 28th, 2017, at the request of Alicia Alonso, I had the honor of saying words of praise to Joaquín and his work, in a solemn act at the Palace of Conventions, on the occasion of him very deservedly receiving the Distinction for National Culture that had been awarded to him years earlier, but which regrettably had not been presented to him.

I said then and now reiterate in the sad moment of his physical departure:
"The Distinction that has just been awarded to you in your homeland finds in your heart the deserved place of honor."